


Niima Heights

by jennity



Series: Niima Heights [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Big Brother Poe sparked her curiosity and passion to learn, Foster-family AU, Friendship, Gen, Original Characters - Freeform, Rey and Finn are closer than best friends, family is bond not blood, mention of 9/11, mention of violent car crash, modern-day AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 07:00:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7704913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jennity/pseuds/jennity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life at Niima Heights isn't perfect, but it's her's.</p><p>Rey Hopewell was sent to live with guardian Unkar Plutt, and grew up with a longing for love, a passion for learning, and a disconcerting acceptance of being abandoned. </p><p>This is the beginning of her story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Niima Heights

**Author's Note:**

> This is a general fic with no ships really. It's rated general because there's no language and any themes that are mentioned aren't explicit enough to really be deserving of a true warning.
> 
> In this story, Rey was born in January of 1993, Finn was born in 1989, and Poe was born in 1980. We start our story in 1998, and follow it through 2006.
> 
> I'm planning to make this a series, but for now it is a stand-alone friendship and family fic.  
> In the series there will be Stormpilot for sure, and ????? for other pairings tbqh
> 
> Set in MA because i'm going to tie in places I'm super familiar with and I'm too lazy to research other places honestly
> 
> I hope you like it. :)<3

****

1998  
Niima Heights Group Home  
Jakku, MA.

Niima Heights was not a glamorous place to live. A scrappy little group home nestled between the skeevy alleys of downtown Jakku and the slowly-rising glitz of the Hollybrook Development Projects, Niima was a place for children between foster homes, or whose fates had been entrusted permanently to the blubbering excuse for human, Unkar Plutt. He was a beast of a man, continually sweat-slicked and emitting a foul stench that reeked of far worse than stale body odor. He was in the fostering game for the meager state-issued checks and the benevolent reputation it gave him amidst the local government. To his kids, though, he was anything but benevolent. Depending on the month, Niima Heights was home to anywhere from three to twenty children of all ages, most of whom looked quite sickly and too thin for their own good. 

The fridge was padlocked, as were the food-filled cupboards in the basement. The kids could not eat outside of their normal schedule of three scanty and nutritionally deficient meals a day, promptly served at 6 AM, 12 noon, and 6 PM. If you missed mealtime by half an hour or more, you missed eating. No snacks were provided, and hiding food to eat elsewhere in the house was expressly forbidden. Plutt claimed it was in order to prevent infestations of bugs and rats, but he would always growl that the real pests of the house were the gremlins with grubby little hands who plagued him day and night. They were never given any treats or desserts, were only allowed outside in their cramped back yard which consisted of mostly weeds and a small cracked blacktop with a basketless hoop for playing ball. If you woke Plutt up during the night, you would be punished, regardless of the reasons, and you should never be silly enough to think to request a bedtime story or night light. No, you slept in the dark in the stark, starched sheets tucked firmly into military-style cots, six to a room. Lights out at eight, no matter what, and even if the sun had not yet set, like during the high-sun summers, you must at least be lying in bed by 8:15 sharp, ready to silently sleep until half past five in the morning to repeat it all again.

Rey Hopewell didn’t love Niima Heights. 

No, Rey didn’t even like Niima Heights, but it was her home, now, her new normal, so she had to deal.

At age five, she was deposited at a babysitter’s for the evening while her parents went to see a play. They never came back. She was informed by child and family services that they had been in a car crash and had died painlessly upon impact. Their bodies were too mangled for the young child to view, and she was kept from the funeral by the state while she was matriculated into The System. Originally, Niima was supposed to be a temporary stop for her. She was the youngest and, at the time of her arrival, the only girl there. Her older brothers were rough at first, exasperated that they had to care for a little girl. She learned to hold her own quickly, would square her shoulders and face their bullying with formidable strength and fiery eyes. But soon she was the favorite amongst her foster siblings who doted on her. She was showered with attention and the boys were resolute in their determination to teach her everything they could so that she could get out of the clutches of Jakku the moment she aged out. They taught her everything. Dash and Doph, brothers whose father was temporarily behind bars, taught her how to fight. Orlando, Lando for short, taught her how to cook. Owen would show her the best bits of junk he could find while dumpster diving, telling her sternly that there is always treasure hidden in the trash that people so carelessly toss away. She would go with him to the pawn shop or help him up-cycle things, since none of them ever had much in the way of money.

Her favorite foster brother, a dark-haired charming boy by the name of Poe, was the one who taught her to read. He provided her with any book he could get his hands on and proudly praised her whenever she finished a new one. He was turning 18 at the end of the year and the moment he aged out he planned on enlisting in the Air Force. He told Rey stories of his veteran parents, whose missions had been regaled to him by them when he was younger and by his abuela when they had died. His fascination with planes was absorbed by little Rey, who eagerly played with all of the model planes and hot wheels she could get her hands on. She watched as he fixed things in Plutt’s other business, the junk yard, which he fiddled around in while Rey watched with rapt attention and constant questions, eyes lit up and shining with curiosity and desire for everything she could memorize and try to take care of.

Too soon for her liking, Poe was packing his few belongings into a canvas duffel bag, hugging his brothers and kneeling in front of Rey with a sad smile. “I’ll be back soon, Starshine,” he told her, wrapping his arms around her frail little body and kissing her softly on the forehead. “I’ll be back to spend Christmases with you, but just not this one. Don’t peek until Christmas morning, but there’s a gift underneath the floorboard under my bed. I’ll miss you, kiddo.” 

He ruffled her hair and resisted the urge to cry as her little pout quivered and her shining eyes blinked several times to hold the tears at bay. She squared her shoulders again, determined to not cry. She wrapped her little arms around his neck and squeezed, whispering “I love you, Poe,” in his ear.

Under her floorboard, that night, she found his favorite leather jacket, wrapped around a journal and an engineering book, a gift-card tucked within the pages with a note reading ‘never stop learning.’ She clutched the book to her chest and slept with the jacket every night for a year, before she hung it neatly on the coat-rack in the hallway outside of her room. Sometimes she imagined that Poe was standing as sentry to the room, not letting anything harm her, chasing her dreams away and preventing Plutt’s wrath from infiltrating her only escape.

Poe’s departure set her on edge. Years went by and he had been deployed, so could not return for Christmas. She turned seven in January of 2000, and soon, three of the other boys who were there when she arrived, Dopheld, Orlando, and Dash, were getting ready to move on. Orlando was the next to leave. He aged out of the system in May of 2000, promptly followed by brothers Dash and Dopheld Mitakka, whose father was released from prison that July, taking the fourteen and twelve year olds with him to live in a transitional housing complex. 

She and Owen were never as close as she was with the others, and he didn’t really know how to handle her. He perceived her has small and fragile, and treated her with kid-gloves which she was incredibly annoyed by. One day, when she was eight, he gave her a hug before heading off to school, telling her she was a good kid and that he’ll miss her. This was…weird for Owen. He and Rey weren’t touchy people to begin with, and they weren’t overly affectionate with one another. It was the day that changed the country and the world forever, but the tragedy that overtook the nation barely phased her. Her last brother, the only person who even remotely cared for her, was gone again. She felt like she had been sent into shock, and everyone at her school assumed it was a result of the fall of the towers. That night, she found out he was never coming back. He didn’t say a proper goodbye, not really. He didn’t tell her he’d be going. She didn’t know where he went, or why, or for how long. It was just her in their bedroom, alone in the dark with her knees drawn up to her chest and her eyes shimmering, jaw clenched in steely resolution to not cry over people leaving ever again, as the news from the downstairs parlour where Plutt had fallen asleep binging on pizza replayed clip after clip of airplanes falling from the sky, smoke billowing up and civilians crying and holding one another. 

All she could think of was, Poe, her Poe, was up in those skies. And none of her brothers were there to comfort her anymore. People chalked her moodiness up to the general melancholic hopelessness that enshrouded the country as a war was waged and patriotism stirred the hearts and fists of everyone who held an American flag in their hands. She was eight, though. She wasn’t upset for her country. She was sad for all those who were lost or missing, all those who would never come home, but she wasn’t angry on behalf of America. She didn’t feel like an American. She felt alone, without family, without country, without a home. Without a purpose. Without love.  
Poe left, flying off like his dreams into the skies over different continents, taking all his adventure with him and leaving her in the dull reality of the shabby house, only to be launched into enemy airspace, possibly to never return. Orlando left, and didn’t leave a forwarding address... Dopheld and Dash got their Dad back, and though their relationship was rocky they had the chance to make a family again. Owen? Owen was just gone. And she wasn’t allowed to ask questions about him. Plutt glowered at her at the very mention of the sandy-blonde haired boy, who wore a perpetual frown and never seemed to sit still.

And then there were her parents.

Part of her, after years of being tormented by Plutt as her "care-giver", didn't believe they were really dead at all. She would make up fantastic alternatives to their bleak and unremarkable demise, rationalizing the lack of closure with her eight-ear-old certainty that they were undercover spies or that they did something heroic but dangerous, like testify against a kingpin, and had to go into hiding.  
Part of her, a more cruel and insistent voice, told her they just didn't want her. Didn't love her. And that's why they never came back. That’s why no one ever came back.  
But no! They weren't dead. She would know if they were dead. She would feel it in her bones.

Soon the house was bustling again, full of younger kids for her to look after like her brothers had done for her. By age nine she was the den-mother to four boys and three girls, from ages three to eight. She kept up her passionate pursuit of her studies. After she got home from school Plutt had set her to work in the junk-yard just like Poe, because he knew she could do it, he didn’t feel like it, and he didn’t have to pay her. She worked until dinner, sometimes missing it to finish a project on time, and then immediately tended to the kiddos and their homework and bedtime routines. She read stories, sang songs, checked math homework, and did laundry. 

Life continued like this for another year, leaving her lonely but busy taking care of the little ones. **2003** When she was ten, she sat under a sycamore during recess, rereading the engineering book Poe had given her that Christmas for at least the fiftieth time. She was as close to relaxed as she could have been, until she glanced up, eyes landing on a disheveled-looking dark-skinned boy who was sweating through a leather jacket. No, not any leather jacket. Her leather jacket. Poe’s leather jacket, complete with the wings stitched onto the upper left hand sleeve, a memorial to his parents. 

Rage overcame her and she launched herself up and onto the older boy, tackling him to the ground and shouting about him being a marauding thief with no regard for the feelings of others. He didn’t struggle, instead laying there in submission, willing her to do what she needed to get it out of her system, and this alarmed her, realizing that he had dark blossoming bruises all across his face. She hastily got up and looked around herself, finding a group of older guys she knew to be more vicious than the toughest playground bully she’d dealt with so far. They were laughing, cackling, and shouting slurs at the boy, who didn’t make eye contact with anyone, just kept his eyes locked on his feet. 

Her fists clenched and eyes narrowed in pure rage again, this time directed at the group of boys advancing on them menacingly. She stepped in front of Finn, determined which of the jerks was the ring-leader of the pack, and stalked up to him, punching him square in the nose which snapped sickeningly and spurted red. Everyone around stopped and stared at this ten year old little girl who broke the nose of one of the fiercest guys in town. His friends were wide-eyed with shock before they started laughing maniacally at the fact that a child took down their alpha-male.

Before the guys could react more, Finn grabbed her hand and ran. She winced at his grip, his fingers squeezing too tightly on her bruised and bloody knuckles, but she let him lead her off campus and kept running until they got to the rickety old gazebo behind the old and depressing-looking church, St. Luke’s. 

They collapsed under the roof of the shabby little gazebo, wheezing and clutching at side-stitches trying to get their breath back. When he was finally able to breathe again, he gasped out,  
“So... Why'd you tackle me? And better yet, why defend me?”

She shrugged, eyes gazing at her brother’s jacket. “That coat you’re wearing. Where’d you get it?” she asked indignantly, rather than answering him.

“I…I’m sorry. I got it at my new house this morning. It was hanging on a coat rack? I didn’t know it was someone else’s, I’m really sorry.” 

She assessed him with a slight frown and sagging shoulders. “Niima?”

He nodded slowly, and she nodded back just once before gritting her teeth. 

“That was Poe’s. He gave it to me when he left for their airforce,” she said quietly, picking at the chipped white paint of the wooden structure. He started to shrug it off to hand it back to her but she shook her head adamantly. “No, no. I think Poe would be okay with you wearing it anyway. You’re my new brother after all. It looks better on you anyway.”

He apprised her before glancing down to where she was examining her sore knuckles. 

“I’m Finn,” he held out a hand to her and she looked at it for a moment before carefully taking it with her own and shaking it firmly.  
Her strength didn’t surprise him in the least, but her genuine and kind smile did. “Rey. I’m Rey.”

And that did it. That was what solidified their friendship.

 

Though she was four years his junior, they were inseparable. Together they looked after the little ones, who would jokingly call them “mum and da,” until Plutt threatened the two of them when he heard a young one say it seriously. 

He integrated into Niima with ease, having been shuffled from house to house since he was a toddler. They would trade off their chores and duties, and while she read for fun, he read for work. He diligently did homework for other kids at school for a small fee, earning him enough to stuff away into a sock for emergencies or special occasions. About once a month, he and Rey would take a blissful whole ten-minute detour from their walk home. He would buy them each a slice of pizza from Jakku's market next to the gas station about five minutes away from Niima. They would sit on the concrete behind the graffitiied dumpster, enjoying the greasy, lukewarm gas station pizza and sipping store brand cola. They would always get busted for being late, as Plutt knew exactly how long each child took to get home. He would send them to bed without dinner, and since they never admitted where they had gone, he was contented in thinking their bellies were growling as he divvied up their two meals between the other seven children. This, rather than upsetting the pair, set their grumbling stomachs at ease, knowing that the kids would have a little extra tonight. 

**2003** flew by without much change, a couple of kids leaving to go back home or get adopted, and the others giving them all the love they had to give.

 **2006** rolled around and Finn turned 17, determined to earn enough money to get himself a small space and maybe have Rey live with him instead. He never told her his plans, though, because she was stubborn. “I can’t leave, Finn. I have to stay.”

She never told him the real reason why, but he knew about the scratch marks hidden under her bed, one for every day she spent in the forsaken little house under Plutt’s “care”. He knew she didn’t believe her parents were gone, that they weren’t going to come back for her someday. If she left, they might never find her. That’s why she really never strayed or requested a different home, despite Plutt’s emotional manipulations. The older she got, though, the skeevier Plutt grew, and Finn snarled at the thought of her being left alone with him, a teenaged girl at his mercy without anyone to help her, without anyone to confide in. 

No, she never admitted it. But she did have another reason why she refused to leave.  
“These kids need me, Finn. I know you have to go. I always knew you would someday. Everyone has to eventually. But the kids need me to look after them, because we both know Plutt won’t.”

"Okay, Peanut. I understand." 

He conceded to her point, and dropped the subject, but he still saved every cent he made. He worked hard, and constantly. Selling homework services, tutoring, babysitting, mowing lawns, shoveling, painting, cleaning gutters and pools, delivering papers, and pumping gas at the nearby station. He was going to get out, and he was going to bring Rey with him.

He was determined to escape Jakku and never come back.


End file.
